


When The Meds Wear Off

by Marfacat



Series: Starscream But In Really Weird Scenarios [5]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: ADHD, ADHD issues, Everyone Is An Asshole, Executive Dysfunction, Gen, Give Starscream back his robot vyvanse, Hyperfocus, Infodumping, Mature Implications, Oversharing (oh christ the oversharing), SI Acquisition, So is Megatron, Someone hit this man with an ‘ok boomer’, Starscream being Starscream, Starscream is a bad boss, The Decepticons are all awful in their own special ways, Volume control issues, just barely, kind of cracky
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:20:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22552393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marfacat/pseuds/Marfacat
Summary: Starscream is off his medications.
Series: Starscream But In Really Weird Scenarios [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1524788
Comments: 69
Kudos: 167





	1. Impulse Control

**Author's Note:**

> I have ADHD myself, so I originally started writing this as catharsis during a bout of frustration. Starscream is my favorite character to project onto, and I relate to a lot of his behaviors and thinking patterns, so I’ve decided that he is Just Like Me no I will not be accepting constructive criticism.
> 
> Anyway, here’s some completely out of the blue fic instead of one of my 3 WIPs. :D

Starscream stared at the report on the datapad, resisting the urge to throw it at the wall of the medbay.

He kept reading the same lines over and over again, knowing exactly what the words meant, but he simply couldn’t focus long enough to actually _understand_ it. It was beyond vexing.

He hadn’t had this issue in  _eons_ - not since his creators had taken him to the neurophsychiatrist and gotten him a coding patch to re-route his focus according to the his conscious priorities. It had been helpful, certainly- but it tended to give him a one-track mind. 

It appeared that the latest  _ punishment _ from his master had caused it to malfunction. He felt like he was outside his own head, fixating on several different irrelevant stimuli at once. 

He set the datapad down as roughly as he could without breaking it, and slipped off the berth.

“ _Knockout!_ ” He barked, trying to ignore the way the air from the vent he was under caressed his wings  _ just  _ _right._ “Get over here! I need you to fix something.”

Silence.

Starscream looked around, finding the med-bay empty. He sent Knockout a ping.

He was ignored. 

He pinged the medic twice more, with increasing urgency. 

Nothing.

With a growl, he stormed into the hall to begin his search for the wayward doctor, fully intending to give him a piece of his mind.

“Commander!” Cried a vehicon, accosting him almost immediately. Starscream’s scowl could have peeled paint.

The drone, sadly, did not seem to register that.

“We have an issue at mine 3-F89 that we need someone to address, and all the other officers are busy,” he said. 

Starscream’s already short temper hit a boiling point, and he rounded on the vehicon with aggressively flared wings.

“Oh, and you presume that _I_ , Lord Megatron’s  _Second in Command_ ,  have time to entertain your little whims, do you?” He shoved him aside. “Get  _ out  _ of my way-”

“ _ Wait! _ ” Called the vehicon, who apparently lacked survival instincts. “There was a cave-in, and nobody’s come to investigate because Lord Megatron is preoccupied with the Prime-” 

Starscream felt a flare of annoyance.

“Oh, of  _ course  _ that oaf would forego his responsibilities in favor of entertaining his little  _obsession_ ,” he spat, and gestured at the datapad clutched in the vehicon’s servos. “Very well, then. Give me the report.” 

When Starscream powered it on, he was greeted with a solid wall of glyphs. He grimaced, handing it back.

“You know what? Just give me the important details on the way there,” The vehicon’s visor brightened.

“Oh, _thank_ you, Commander!” He chirped. “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this-”

“ _Details_ , not frivolous little inanities,” Starscream snapped. “And after this debacle is settled, I’m taking your desgnation and putting a strike on your record for insubordination.” 

The vehicon didn’t seem to hear him, already babbling away.

“Well, exactly two hours and seventeen minutes ago, the structural integrity in mine shaft E was compromised by one of our drills, causing a chain reaction that led to the near-complete collapse of the upper sections...”

Starscream had to put conscious effort into not tuning out.

...

“A ’ _cave-in’_... ” Starscream muttered, glaring at the half-collapsed mountainside as if had personally insulted him. “ _This_ is practically an  _ avalanche!_” 

“Whoa, whoa-  _ shh!_” Hissed the vehicon, shaking his head. Starscream turned his glare on him.

“Ex- _cuse _ me-”

“You can’t be too loud here, you might cause another landslide!” He whispered. Starscream suppressed a shriek of rage.

“ _Whose_ idea was it to mine  _here_ ,  of all places?!” He whisper-shouted. The vehicon glanced away nervously.

“Er-  _ yours_, sir.” Starscream blinked.

“Why didn’t anybody  _ tell _ me that this place is unstable?” He hissed.

“We tried, sir.” 

Starscream grit his denta.

“Well, you idiots should have been competent enough not to drill into structurally unstable walls!” He snapped. 

“Probably,” the vehicon agreed. Starscream straightened victoriously.

“Then  _ why  _ are you  _ complaining _ and blaming  _ me?!_” The vehicon sighed.

“Sorry, sir,” he said. Starscream flicked his wings imperiously.

“Consider this another strike on your record,” he declared. “Now, then- how many drones do we have at our disposal?” 

The vehicon winced.

“I’m the only one who escaped,” he said. 

Starscream looked between him and large pile of mud and boulders that used to be the entrance to the mine.

“Ah.” He activated his comm. ‘ _ This is Commander Starscream. All units not currently occupied are to report to my location with any available digging equipment. _ ’

Five minutes and a single groundbridge later, there were about seven vehicons and three eradicons at the scene, making for a total of ten mechs.

“Are you  _ serious?_” Starscream grumbled. “There are over _five-hundred drones_ and only  _ ten  _ were available?” 

In contrast, the original vehicon’s visor was bright with enthusiasm.

“Wow, what a turnout!” He gushed. Starscream glared at him, then turned to the gathered mechs.

“Alright, you know the drill,” he drawled, gesturing vaguely to the mess. “Start digging.” 

He stood off to the side, watching them trudge about and haul boulders with shaky arms. It was fairly unimpressive. 

He picked at his claws, spacing out and falling into a daydream about telling Megatron to get fragged. To his  _face_.  In his reverie, everyone clapped and cheered, clearly recognizing his  _ amazing _ leadership skills-

‘ _ Starscream! _ ’ The seeker straightened with a yelp as his comm blasted his audio feed loudly enough that some of the nearby drones glanced at him curiously.

‘ _Master_ , ’ he replied nervously. ‘ _ To what do I owe the pleasure? _ ’ 

‘ _Why_ _ have you taken  _ my _ drones off the ship without permission?_’

Since when had he needed  _ permission? _ He was the Second in Command!  _ Soundwave  _ never needed to ask permission to do anything-

‘ _ I’m waiting for an answer, Starscream, _ ’ Megatron growled. The seeker squeaked.

‘ _Well, you see, there was a cave-in at one of the mines-’ _

‘ _ Which mine? _ ’ Megatron interrupted. Starscream scowled.

Which one?  _ Which one? _ Who did he think he _was_ -

Oh, scrap. Which one  _ was _ this, again?

‘ _It’s the one in the mountain range... You know, fairly high up, near the edge of a cliff-_ ’

‘ _Starscream, there are seven mines that fit that description. Do _ not _ test my patience._’ Megatron’s voice got low and dangerous. ‘ _If you are planning something, there will not be a frame left for Knockout to fix. Give. Me. The. Serial number._ ’

Starscream shivered, looking around helplessly. He couldn’t very well ask the  drones,  he’d look like a fool! 

‘ _ Can’t you just ask Soundwave? _ ’ He tried, well aware he was treading on thin ice. Megatron’s warning growl gave him all the answers he was going to get.

Slag. Which one was the original vehicon again?

‘ _ Starscream, I will put you back in the med-bay for this- _ ’

“What mine is this?” He blurted, shaking like a leaf. The drones all looked up at him.If Starscream had been capable of sweating, he and the ground below him would have been drenched.

“3-F89,” they replied in unison.

‘- _and then_ slowly _ slice off your wings-_’

‘ _ 3-F89! _ ’ He shouted desperately over the comm, debating the wisdom of tearing off into the sky to never be seen or heard from again. ‘ _ I apologize for the hesitation, I... Forgot. Briefly. _ ’ 

There was a pause. 

‘ _Soundwave has confirmed that what you have said is true_ _,_ ’ Megatron said, and Starscream could just  _ feel  _ that creepy leer of his burning holes into his plating. ‘ _You would do well not to display such incompetence again. I have no use for a Second who cannot even remember the names of his_ own mines _. You have one hour, then your presence is required on the bridge. If you are healed enough to be supervising mining operations, you are healed enough to do your  _ actual  _ job.’_

Oh, frag- Starscream had completely forgotten about the coding patch! Just another example of why he needed it, really. 

‘ _Yes, Master,_ ’ he replied, not bothering to argue that supervision of mining activity  _ was _ actually a part of his job (especially since no one else seemed inclined to do so.) 

Megatron cut the line off without another word, charming mech that he was. Starscream turned back to the workers with renewed energy.

“Dig  faster!” He screeched. “We’re on a time limit,  _ move!_” 

One of the Eradicons scoffed.

“If it’s so important, why don’t you come and  _ help _ instead of standing around?” She snapped. 

Everyone froze. Starscream raised his optical ridges and leveled her with a Look.

Had she been one of the grounders, she would have been shot. She was a _flier_ , however- one of  _ his_. He expected more from the Eradicons, held them to stricter standards.

She should have  _ known  _ better, just as all the other winged mecha under his command did. 

“Do I need to send you to the good doctor for a  _ reformat?_” He hissed. “Or will you  _ behave yourself?_” 

The Eradicon stiffened.

“Forgive me, Commander Starscream,” she said, bowing her head. “I was out of line.” 

Starscream smirked. Moments like this made it easier to forget his precarious position in Decepticon High Command, and he  relished  them. One day, _everyone_ would address him with the proper respect he deserved. 

“See to it that it does not happen again.” He gave her a once-over, noting the obvious exhaustion in her posture and the poor condition of her paint. “You are clearly in no condition to be useful, anyway. Go back to the ship.” 

He dismissed her with a wave of his servo, and everyone watched her leave through the groundbridge, to his annoyance.

“Enough dallying!” Starscream barked, turning back to the nine remaining drones. “ _ Dig! _ ” 

The workers returned to their task with a collective groan, which Starscream pointedly ignored. He spent about two minutes watching them struggle with the massive boulders before his patience wore thin.

“Oh, the lot of you are  _ pathetic!_” He snapped. “What, are you made of  tin? Let me show you how it’s done.” 

He shooed a drone away from a boulder that almost reached his knees, picked it up with minimal effort, and hurled over the edge of the cliff. 

“I have to do  _ everything _ myself...” he muttered, dusting off his servos, then noticed the blank stares of all the drones around him. “You see? Lift with your legs, put more  _ effort _ into it!”

The drones continued to stare.

“Uh, Commander?” Said a vehicon, raising their servo nervously. “We can’t do that.” 

Starscream narrowed his optics. Primus, they really  were  made of tin!

“A pity there wasn’t anything left of Shockwave to revive and kill again,” he grumbled. “ _Fine_. In lieu of a  _ competent _ team, I suppose  _ I _ shall have to assist.” 

The drones, asinine creatures that they were, all cheered like a bunch of idiots. Starscream grabbed a bigger boulder and shoved it away from the pile.

...

It took about fifteen minutes for them to clear most of the rubble away from the entrance, and Starscream _refused_ to admit that he was getting tired (like some sort of high-caste _trophy conjunx_ who had never worked a day in their life- no, he was  _ fine_). He doubled down on the rock-lifting, ignoring the way his fresh welds and newly-repaired struts ached.

They cut a rather narrow path trough the rock as they entered the mine, packing rubble into the sides of the shaft to make room for at least three mechs to walk side by side if they stood close. Some distance in, they were met with a small pocket of miners huddled around a communications console. 

“You came back for us,” one of them whimpered in awe, voice thick with emotion. 

Starscream grimaced.  _Ew_.

“Go back to the ship and get cleaned up,” he ordered, pointing to the exit. “I expect a full report on your incompetence by the end of the day!” 

The smaller drones hastened to obey, occasionally staring at him like he was Primus incarnate.

Oh, just what he needed- a  _fan club_. He threw himself back into his digging with a shudder, trying not to think about the disgusting,  _ syrupy _ emotions the idiots were  _ oozing _ out of their fields before they mercifully made themselves scarce. 

...

Five minutes later, Starscream was beginning to feel homicidal.

“I  _ still _ can’t believe none of you could be bothered to bring any _digging equipment_ ,” he muttered to himself, ignoring the unattractive wear that his claws were being subjected to. He could always sharpen them later, but he had forty minutes to go and they had barely passed into the first shaft. 

“Hey, I think I found something!” One of the Eradicons called, brushing debris off the tip of a drill. 

Starscream’s optics widened.

“Yes,  _ yes!_” He cried, pointing excitedly. “Everyone, focus your efforts on that!” 

Within ten minutes, they had it cleared. Thankfully, it appeared not to have been in use at the time of the collapse. 

“Which one of you was the miner?” Starscream asked, scanning the nine identical faceplates behind him. 

The original vehicon raised his hand. Starscream pointed to the drill. 

“Go clear a path for the rest of us.” He paused to think. “Which of the shafts were occupied?” 

“Only E, B, and D, sir,” the miner replied. Starscream nodded.

“Which one are we in?” He asked.

“Shaft B, sir.” Starscream nodded. 

“Excellent,” he purred. “Get up there, we only have twenty-eight minutes left before we have to leave.” 

...

As Starscream followed the drill further into the collapsed mine, he began to feel increasingly anxious. Without something to occupy his mind, he couldn’t help but think about the tons of rock _trapping_ him in the mountain on _every side_ , or the fact that his only (very narrow) exit was blocked by eight idiots who would likely get in his way should the whole thing come _crashing down on top of them and_ _ crush them into paste- _

No, he was not happy. 

“I found another pocket!” The miner called, pushing the drill through and leaving an entrance for the rest of them. He made a choking noise. “Oh,  _frag_ -”

“Congratulations, you’ve been saved,” Starscream drawled, climbing in after the vehicon. “You’re welco-  _ ack!_” He hastily turned away, covering his optics with a servo.

“...  _Commander Starscream?_ ” One of the previously trapped miners squeaked, completely frozen in their... _Compromising_ position. 

“What are you  _ doing?!_” The seeker shrieked, stopping the rest of the party from entering the pocket with an outstretched servo.

“In our defense,” the other vehicon said, entirely too nonchalant to have been caught with open panels by his superior, “we honestly thought we were going to die.” 

Starscream couldn’t take it anymore. He fled the mine.

...

As soon as was back out in the fresh, breezy air, Starscream was immediately assaulted by urgent pings from both Megatron and Knockout. He checked his chronometer.

“Scrap,” he muttered. He was seven minutes late. ‘ _ Soundwave, I require a groundbridge to my location _ _._ ’ 

‘ _ Starscream: in so much trouble. Soundwave: will be recording. _ ’ The usually silent mech commed back, adding humorous subglyphs to his message. 

Starscream scowled.

“‘Why aren’t you more like _Soundwave_ , Starscream?’” He mocked in a falsetto, waving his servos around for effect. “‘He’s never irritating at  _ all!_’ Stupid glitch.”

The groundbridge appeared, and he trudged through, ignoring the vague feeling that he was forgetting something.

...

Deep in the mine, the drones all stared down the shaft Starscream had disappeared through. 

“Did he just  _ leave  _ us?” An Eradicon squeaked.

“Oh, shut it,  _Commander’s pet_ ,” a vehicon hissed, waving him off. “We can function without him  _holding our servos_.”

The indecent miner still had his panels open, to the mortification of his partner.

“Wanna join in?” He asked, beckoning the exhausted group with a dimmed visor. 

The Eradicon simply turned around and walked away.

...

Starscream slumped on the med-bay’s berth, pouting under Knockout’s withering glare.

“ _What_ is your  _ problem?!_” The medic shouted, optic twitching. 

Starscream straightened, pulling an injured back strut.

“ _Ow!_ ” He hissed. “But, wait! Yes! A problem, I have a  _ problem!_” 

Knockout was thoroughly unimpressed.

“I’d say more than _one_ ,” he muttered. “First, you don’t stop pinging me, then you go radio silent, and _then_ you show up over an hour later covered in dirt and dust to get beaten _again!_ ” 

Starscream scowled petulantly.

“For your  _ information_, I was leading a rescue mission in a collapsed mine,” he snapped defensively. 

Knockout gripped the side of the berth hard enough to leave gouges.

“You were  _ supposed _ to be on _ berthrest!_” He exclaimed, voice crescendoing until it echoed into the halls. “Not to mention, we don’t  _ do  _ rescue missions, _especially_ during times of crisis!” 

Starscream slumped a bit. He’d forgotten about that.

“Well- well, that’s just  _ stupid!_” He exclaimed, trying not to let his embarrassment bleed into his field. “A waste of resources! It was a _good idea!_ ” 

Knockout took a deep in-vent, then slowly released it. 

“Commander,” he began slowly, “the  only  reason I’m not strapping you down to the berth right now is because the _last_ time I tried to do that, Lord Megatron popped one of my tires.”

Starscream glared at him, crossing his arms.

“You can’t threaten me! I  _ outrank _ you!” 

In a flash, Knockout gripped his jaw and forced him to look directly into his furious optics.

“You listen here, you little  _ glitch_,” the medic hissed through a strained smile, “in matters that require medical expertise, I am the  _ highest ranking mech on this ship_. I have a  _ long  _ queue of patients, no thanks to your little  _escapade_ , and  _ you  _ went and made yourself priority number one by _undoing_ all my hard work to  _ keep you in one piece!_” 

Starscream said nothing, flattening his dented wings against his back with wide optics. Knockout continued,

“ _You _ are going to  _ shhhut _ the frag up and behave yourself, or I’ll switch your legs while you’re in stasis and tell Megatron that you’re irreversibly crippled so that he’ll _blast you through the spark!_ Are we clear?” 

Starscream nodded mutely. Knockout released his face.

“Good. Lay down.” Starscream complied, then jolted and raised a shaky servo. Knockout grit his denta. “ _ What _ .” 

“I... have a processor glitch that affects focus and memory, and the patch coding seems to be malfunctioning,” he wheezed in one long ex-vent. 

Knockout stared at him, then threw his head back with a long, put-upon sigh.

“ _Fine_ ,” he groaned, unspooling his hardline connector to put Starscream into stasis. “Between you and the Autobots, this has just been the  _ worst _ day.”

He plugged it into one of Starscream’s ports with more force than strictly necessary, uploaded the medical stasis overrides, and yanked it back out again. 

He stared at Starscream’s unconscious frame a long moment, then pantomimed throttling him as he suppressed a scream.

“Couldn’t even be bothered to read the damned mission report and  _ help  _ us out there,” the medic muttered under his breath, glaring icily at the forgotten datapad on one of the counters. He turned to grab his tools, revealing scratches and dents all up and down his backside. “One of these days, I am  going to _kill_ him.” 


	2. Bitch You Thought

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s not so simple!!!
> 
> None of it. None of it is. 
> 
> That’s the entire spirit of the chapter: everything is fucking hard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m back with this bullshit, which I can promise is 1000000% faithful to the ADHD experience because I wrote it as catharsis when dealing with the exact shit described here. 
> 
> If y’all haven’t noticed yet, I really like projecting. 
> 
> Anyway, thanks for all the support for last chapter- here’s another massive dose of Dysfunctional!Starscream :)

“Well, it looks like you’re out of luck.”

Starscream’s spark dropped into the pit of his tanks. Slowly, painfully, he twisted his head towards Knockout. His face was fixed in an unusually, and completely insincere, polite smile.

“ _What?_ ” He asked in a small, pleasant voice. “I don’t think I heard you right, Doctor- could you repeat yourself?” 

Knockout’s stare was flat and unimpressed.

“I don’t have the means to patch your little coding glitch up,” he said. “You’re just going to have to  _ deal_.”

Starscream’s smile abruptly fell, and he grabbed Knockout by the shoulders with a terrified expression.

“No, nonono,” he said, “you don’t  _understand_ - I  _ need  _ that coding patch, I can’t function without it!”

Knockout recoiled at the close proximity of Starscream’s face, giving him an odd look.

“Starscream, I can’t-”

“What do you think today  _was_ , Doctor?” The seeker continued, beginning to panic. “I didn’t even know there was a  _ fight _ going on! A  _fight_ , Knockout! An  _ entire battle!_” 

He released the unfortunate medic’s shoulders and began to pace.

“No, no, no- If this doesn’t get fixed, I’m going to start _missing_ _things!_ I can’t  _ miss  _ things, in the Second in Command! If my performance falls- or worse, if  _ Lord Megatron _ were to find out-”

He cut himself off, running his servos down his face with a wheeze. He whirled around and marched right into Knockout’s personal space, looming over him.

“ _ Why can’t you fix this?! _ ” He shrieked, flaring his wings up behind him and blocking out the light. 

Knockout took two large, very pointed steps back, glaring at him.

“This requires a highly specialized skillset, I don’t know enough about processor coding to do it!” He snapped, throwing his servos in the air. “Whatever Lord Megatron did to you, it made your systems flush out  all foreign code! I don’t know what this patch supposed to  _ look like_ _,_ I don’t know where it’s supposed to  _ go_ _,_ and I don’t even know how to  _ navigate _ your head because it’s a  _ circus _ in there!”

Starscream fumed.

“ _Excuses!_ ” He spat with a condemning swipe of his servo. “ All you have to do is redirect my attention to my  _ actual conscious priorities! _ It took less than an _hour_ , last time!”

Knockout grit his denta.

“I don’t know how many repetitions it’s going to take to get it into your  _ fragging processor_ _,_ ” he snapped, jabbing a digit at Starscream’s chest plate, “that  _ I! Am not! A neuropsychiatrist!_” 

They stared each other down for a moment, letting the words hang in the air. Starscream finally looked away. 

“I don’t know how to work with this glitch,” he said quietly. “That’s the whole reason I had to have the patch installed in the first place- it is potentially _debilitating!_ ” 

Knockout inspected his claws.

“I fail to see how that’s  my  problem,” he replied. “It’s outside my skill set.”  


Starscream rounded on him.

“I could be  _ killed!_” He shrieked. “If Lord Megatron finds out that I have no way to _manage_ this, he’s going to  get rid of me!” His wings dipped, simpering. “You don’t want me to  _die_ ,  do you, Knockout?” 

The medic’s face screwed up in thought, attention still focused on his claws. Starscream bristled. 

“Oh,  _ come on!_” 

Knockout held up a digit.

“Shh, I’m  _ thinking_,” he said. 

He tilted his head to one side, as if considering a silent argument, and then the other. 

He raised his optical ridges as if to concede a point, then furrowed them again as a rebuttal came to mind. 

Starscream’s arms and wings were slack at his sides, and he stared at Knockout’s display of inner conflict with increasing incredulity. 

“Hm...” the medic finally decided, curling his lip in resignation. “I suppose I probably  _ don’t  _ want you to die.” 

“Your _conviction_ is especially reassuring,” Starscream snapped, slouching. He puffed back up, looking down on Knockout imperiously. “Either way- there  _ must _ be some research you can do on the topic!” 

Knockout shot him a deadpan glare.

“I’m  _ very  _ busy, Starscream,” he said. “I don’t have  _ time  _ for-”

“I thought you said you  _ didn’t _ want me to die!” Starscream shrieked. Knockout turned around and began to arrange his tools.

“I don’t want a _lot_ of things to happen,” he replied nonchalantly. “Doesn’t mean they  won’t.”

Starscream’s servos shook.

“Knockout,  _please_ ,” he begged, voice wavering. 

The medic paused, and looked over his shoulder at him. Something in Starscream’s expression or posture must have struck a chord, because Knockout vented a long sigh, slumping his shoulders and staring up at the ceiling with the most _put-upon_ face.

“ _Fine_ , ” he muttered. “But don’t expect this to resolve itself anytime soon. You’re going to have to find some way to keep functioning without it until I can find something useful.” 

Starscream nodded fervently.

“Of course- I can manage for a little while, probably.” He tapped his chin with a digit, smirking to himself. “This _is_ only temporary, after all. How hard could it  _ possibly _ be?” 

...

It was _hard,_ as Starscream found out that night. It was really fragging hard.

He blinked and shook his head, reading over the sentence for the fifth time in a row. 

He wondered how the research was going, and if Knockout had found any-

_ Frag! _

Starscream re-read the sentence out loud.

“Raw energon deposits have been thirty percent depleted over the past twelve months-”

Wait. He wasn’t processing any of that, he was too wrapped up in  _ pronouncing  _ the glyphs!

Starscream looked to the small pile of untouched datapads that had accumulated over the past couple days on the small outcropping next to his berth, releasing an aggravated whine. 

No, he couldn’t give up _yet!_ Again!

Raw energon deposits  ( _like the crystals, you know what those are!_ ) have been thirty percent depleted  ( _decreased, less than, fewer, etc.- not as many of the crystals_ ) over the past twelve months  ( _earth stellar cycle, you know those, you know this time frame_ ) ...

Eventually, after much painstaking redirection of his focus, Starscream got to the end of the report.

“Success!” He cheered, stacking it neatly on top of the one he’d finished before it. 

Two down, twenty more to go!

_... Twenty more to go. _

Starscream stared at the unread reports.

“I hate this,” he said flatly.

...

The next morning, Starscream felt as if his processor was phasing through his head sideways. He hadn’t recharged at all.

He trudged to the bridge (not for any particular reason, it simply felt as if it was somewhere he needed to be), not knowing what in the almighty _frag_ he was supposed to do about the information on those reports-

_ The reports!  _ He was supposed to relay orders and suggestions to Soundwave regarding the information on them!

He sprinted back to his room, grabbed the small stack of datapads-

And realized he had no input to give. 

In fact, what was even _on_ those stupid things, in the first place? Mining reports, one conduct incident report, and some new combat training scenario proposals... Something like that. 

Wait a minute- _why_ did there need to be much discussion about these matters, again?

Starscream couldn’t think of any particularly good reason.

Well, he could just drop the mining reports off with Soundwave and deal with the rest himself! In fact, there was no (formal) rule stating that he had to get (approval) _a_ _second opinion_ from him before taking action, anyway! 

His mind made up, he practically skipped to the bridge and dumped the fifteen mining reports at Soundwave’s station. The spymaster gave him a blank look that was somehow exhausted.

“HiSoundwaveherearetheminingreportsnothingoutoftheordinaryIhavenofurthercommentsgoodbye!” Starscream chirped, and was out of the room before anyone could blink.

_ Success! _

Next: incident report!

He traipsed down to the drones’ quarters and rapped loudly on the door, bouncing energetically on the tips of his pedes as he waited.

“... Yeah?” Asked a vehicon, peeking out. They immediately stiffened. “Commander Starscream, sir!” 

All the ambient noise from inside the room was immediately silenced. Starscream brushed past the mech at the door, striding purposefully into the center of the room.

“I heard there was a fight!” He announced more loudly than he had intended. “Where are...” He fumbled with the datapads, and scrolled through the right one once he found it. “Troopers 8-F35 and 5-F24?” 

He received a room full of blank stares.

“Uh, sir?” One squeaked. Starscream eyed him sharply.

“Yes?” He snapped impatiently. “Are you either one of them?” 

The vehicon shifted nervously.

“No,” he said, “but, um. I think you mean Waldo and Josephine.”

Immediately, there was a chorus of derision.

“Oh,  _ boo!_”

“Really, Steve? Really?”

“You fragging  _ snitch!_”

Starscream reset his vocalizer very pointedly, and the room quieted.

“Right,” he said. “Where are  those two? ” 

Silence. Bribery it was, then.

“I’m giving the day off to the first person to reveal the culprits!” He declared. 

Immediately, seventy servos pointed at a very disgruntled looking pair sitting on a bench in the corner, which had been crudely labeled ‘get-along seat.’ Starscream subspaced his datapads and marched up to it, and they immediately straightened. 

“Commander, sir!” One yelped, doing a clumsy salute. The other slouched again.

“Can it, _bootlicker_ ,” he snapped. 

“What is the meaning of this idiocy?” Starscream asked, looming over the both of them with spread wings. The second one groaned.

“ _He_ fragged my partner in front of  _everyone_ ,” he complained. The first crossed his arms.

“ _Shelby _ can do whatever they want,” he replied. “Besides, they wouldn’t have come to  _ me _ if _you_ were better at-”

“ _ Ahem! _ ” Starscream glared down at them, and they shrank back a tad.

_ Grounders. _

“I don’t know  _ what  _ Breakdown lets you get away with, but this behavior is  _ completely _ unbecoming of Decepticon soldiers such as yourselves!” He lectured, putting his servos on his hips and ignoring the tired stares he was receiving from the troops.  


“Back when  _ I  _ was still in training for the military, I knew an idiot who got  _ completely disowned _ by his _entire_ family for getting into too many physical altercations over personal drama, and we all  _ laughed  _ at him behind his back because that was the socially acceptable thing to do! Do you have _any_ idea how  _ rigorous_...”

He just kept talking and talking and talking. The vehicons were beginning to fidget uncomfortably.

Out of the corner of his optic, he noticed a tentative servo rising into the air.

“And  _ that  _ was how I learned that acknowledging physical and emotional limits is unacceptable under _any_ circumstances, because my wings hurt for _three days_ afterward.” He pointed at the servo. “What do you want?” 

“I totally get where you’re coming from, but isn’t bottling up your stress, like, super unhealthy?” A vehicon asked. All their peers took a very large step away from them. “I mean, you’re always yelling at people, or slapping them, and stuff. Maybe you should find a healthy outlet, or something.” 

Starscream bristled.

“Wha-  _ Megatron  _ does that all the time!” He snapped. A collective shudder ran across the room. “What? What makes  _ him  _ so special?”

“Lord Megatron looked at me once, and I couldn’t stop crying for the rest of the day,” someone in the back piped up. “He’s scary, I don’t want to tell him to calm down.” 

Starscream wanted to argue with that logic, seeing as _he_ was _also_ scary, but a glance at his chronometer revealed that he was almost late for combat training with his Eradicons. He stiffened.

“Oh, frag,” he muttered. “Dismissed! No more fighting- I will  _ find  _ _you!_ ” He narrowed his optics at the gathering of Vehicons menacingly, then sprinted out to the hall and blasted away in his alt-mode.

The vehicons stared at the empty doorway.

“... What the fuck just happened?” One of them asked. “Also, do we get the day off?”

The vehicons began murmuring amongst themselves about that.

...

Hours later, Starscream trudged into the med-bay to bother Knockout once again.

“Starscream,” the medic purred with false pleasantness, “what brings you to my humble corner of the ship?” 

The seeker grunted noncommittally and decided to collapse face-first onto the berth, wings drooping tiredly at his sides. Knockout frowned.

“Uh, Commander? Are you unwell?” Starscream shook his head. Knockout clenched his denta.  _ Spoiled, entitled little-  _ “Then,  _ why _ are you on the berth?”

Starscream pushed himself up a bit, squinting at the slab of metal and then into empty air.

“I... Don’t actually know,” he muttered, and Knockout couldn’t help but note the pale tint of his washed-out optics. “I don’t even know why I’m  _ here!_”

Clearly, whether he was aware of it or not, Starscream needed help. Knockout tentatively approached him.

“How are you feeling?” He asked hesitantly. 

Starscream groaned tiredly.

“Exhausted,” he complained. “Everything is just...  Too much. There’s so much going on and I just want it to be  _quiet_.”

Oh, the  _ irony_. This  _ had _ to be some sort of karma.

“Have you been recharging?” Knockout asked flatly. Starscream paused to process that, then shook his head.

“No  _time_ ,” he moaned. “I hate this ship. I hate _everything_. I want the universe to stop existing for awhile.”

Knockout raised his optical ridges, unimpressed.

“Mhm. Go get some recharge,” he said. 

“Mmkay,” Starscream replied, not moving. 

It became clear to Knockout that he intended to do so  _ right on his medical berth_ _,_ where he most certainly did _not_ belong unless it was an _emergency_.

... Perhaps he’d had too many emergencies of late, because he seemed awfully comfortable on it.

“... In your  _ own  _ berth,” Knockout specified. Starscream whined.

“But, it doesn’t  _ suck  _ in here!” He complained. 

Given how the last visit had gone, Knockout was beginning to develop uncharacteristic concern for Starscream’s emotional well-being for seeing _him_ as a sort of safe-haven. He quickly shook it off. 

Feelings.  _ Ew. _

“If you want to stay in here, I’d be  more  than happy to have a  _ research assistant_ _,_ ” he said pointedly, picking at his claws. “I’m a busy mech, and there are a  _ lot  _ of datapads to slog through.”

Starscream stopped dejectedly pressing his face into the berth and perked up. 

“Oh?” He asked. 

...

After about five seconds of reading, it was like a switch had been flipped. Knockout had never seen Starscream this focused on  _ anything _ before. 

The seeker was muttering the glyphs to himself, shaking his leg so hard that Knockout feared he’d wear the joints out, and his pupils were blown wide. 

It had been two hours, and he’d already chewed through half of what was, to Knockout’s understanding, a massive pre-war neuropsychology textbook. He didn’t show any signs of slowing down.

The medic took advantage of the rare silence to organize his materials and do a little research himself. 

He couldn’t say he’d ever particularly liked neuroscience of any sort, mostly because he always ended up with some nasty realizations about his  _ own _ processor that he very much  did _not want to think about._

The fact that he was researching  _ coding glitches  _ made it even worse. 

Starscream, oddly enough, seemed to have no such qualms (despite the fact that he obviously had  _ many  _ problems and was  extremely  sensitive to accusations of imperfection). He was eating it up. 

Knockout hadn’t actually been  serious  about the whole ‘research assistant’ thing, but it was beginning to seem like a good idea. 

Now, getting Starscream to give him a proper summary of his findings could prove to be more difficult-

“ _ Knockout! _ ” The seeker yelled excitedly.“Looklooklooklook _ look! _ ” 

He shoved the datapad in the medic’s face, pointing to a particular subsection in the chapter on processor circuitry.

“Isn’t this  _ fascinating?_” He shouted, grinning like a maniac. “I never realized the cause of so many processor glitches was  _ physiological  _ and not simply coding errors!”

Knockout, who was slightly afraid of this abrupt change in attitude, forced a smile.

“ _Wow_ ,” he said cheerfully. “That  _is_ pretty neat!”

Starscream’s thousand-watt smile grew into more of a sunbeam-powered ray of cosmic doom, and-  _Primus_ , did he just  _ flutter his wings? _

“I  _know_ ,  right?! Anyway...” 

He just didn’t. Stop. _Talking._ It was like someone had whacked him upside the head with a thesaurus so hard it had gotten lodged in his processor. 

Breakdown (bless him) entered after a good eight or so minutes of uninterrupted chatter, and Knockout sent him an imploring look.

“Hey, uh, Doc?” He asked. Starscream stiffened, evidently not having noticed his arrival. “I’ve got some reports for you to fill out.” 

Knockout clapped his servos together with fake cheer.

“Well, I’d better get going!” He said. Starscream unconsciously slouched.

“Oh,” he murmured. “Alright, then. I- I  _ also  _ have reports, and I was just going to leave, actually-” he jerked a thumb-digit over his shoulder awkwardly, and shuffled to the door.

Despite his best efforts, Knockout was starting to feel kind of bad about that, seeing as Starscream  wasn’t _actually_ being a caustic jackass for once in his life.

“Hey, Starscream?” He called. 

The seeker turned to look at him, doing a very bad job of masking the hopefulness in his expression. 

_ Sigh. _

“I still want to hear about your findings- do you think you could type them up on a datapad for me?” 

That thousand-watt smile returned with a vengeance. Knockout was going to go blind at this rate.

“Of course! When do you want it?” The seeker asked, wings just barely fluttering from their perked position high in the air. 

“Anytime you can get them to me tomorrow,” Knockout replied smoothly, waving him off. “Go get some recharge before you collapse.” 

“Goodbye!” Starscream chirped, probably completely ignoring Knockout’s suggestion, before practically  skipping  out the door to find his next victim.

Breakdown was giving him a suspicious (but admittedly justified, given his history) look.

“I thought you didn’t like neuroscience,” he said. He paused a moment. “You didn’t  _reprogram_ him, did you?” 

Good old Breakdown. Knockout could always count on him to boost his ego by assuming he was skilled at everything.

“No,” he replied, not bothering to inform his assistant that he was not, in fact, capable of rewiring someone’s entire neural net. No need to break the illusion of perfection. “That’s  _ all _ him.”

He waved his servo at the door Starscream had disappeared through. Breakdown stared at it for a minute, then looked back to Knockout.

“Huh,” he said, concealing a smile. “You just seemed to  _ like _ him more than usual. You’re not that _easy_ on most people.” 

The medic bristled at the implication that he was developing a- a _fondness_ for the galaxy’s most obnoxious pain in the aft. He was a _Decepticon_ , he didn’t have  _ soft spots _ (Breakdown notwithstanding).

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he snapped. 

Breakdown’s side-glance told him all he needed to know about his partner’s opinion on the matter. Knockout glared at him. 

“Just give me the stupid reports!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea where I’m going with this, I’ve got a million different weird little potential plot branches in my head and they all kind of stop at random intervals. (I mean, this fic isn’t special in that regard, but.)
> 
> This is definitely going to have sporadic updates- my motivation to write is entirely fueled by my desire to bitch (but stealthily). 
> 
> Thanks for reading! Don’t forget leave comments or kudos if you enjoyed!!! :)

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t know jack about mining or geology, so the mining bits are probably inaccurate.
> 
> I like writing Doc Knock pissed off, it’s one of the less-frequently-explored aspects of his character. Not that I condone threatening injured patients into submission. Or threatening to reformat your subordinates for sass. Or leaving your subordinates to die in a cave-in. 
> 
> The Decepticons need group therapy.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, don’t forget to comment or leave kudos if you enjoyed!


End file.
